Nineveh Governorate (Arabic: نینوى‎ Nīnewē, Kurdish: مووسڵMûsil, Syriac: ܢܝܢܘܐNīnwē) is a governorate in northern Iraq, which contains the ancient Assyrian city of Nineveh. It has an area of 37,323 square kilometres (3.7323×1010 m2) and an estimated population of 2,453,000 people in 2003. Its chief city and provincial capital is Mosul, which lies across the Tigris river from the ruins of ancient Nineveh. Tal Afar is also a major city within the region. Before 1976, it was called Mosul Province and it included the present-day Dohuk Governorate.

An ethnically and culturally diverse region, it has been subject to attacks by the terrorist organization known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, with Mosul being captured on 10 June 2014, and many places of worship destroyed.[2]

After the invasion, the military of the province was led by (then Major General) David Petraeus of the 101st Airborne Division and later by (then Brigadier General) Carter Ham as the multi-national brigade for Iraq. During the American civil head of the local office of the Coalition Provisional Authority was a US Foreign Service Officer and former Kurdish refugee to the States. Mustafa administered her nominees on the provincial council and through members of the Kashmoula family.

In June 2004, Osama Kashmoula became the interim governor of the province and in September of the same year he was assassinated en route to Baghdad. He was succeeded as interim Governor by Duraid Kashmoula, who was elected governor in January 2005. Duraid Kashmoula resigned in 2009.[3] In April 2009, Atheel al-Nujaifi, a hardline Arab nationalist and member of Al-Hadba, became governor.[4]

Nineveh Province is multiethnic. There are significant numbers of Arabs, indigenous Assyrians, Kurds, Yazidis as well as Shabaks both in towns and cities, and in their own specific villages and regions. There are also numbers of Turkmen and Armenians.

Since no real census has been taken for decades, the election results are the only indicator of the province's ethnic distribution. It should be noted that many Assyrians and Yazidis claim that ballot papers were denied them; in addition, many members of ethnic groups voted for mainstream parties or ethnic parties that were attached to mainstream Arab or Kurdish led parties.[9]

Many Assyrian[which?]leaders advocate an autonomous region within Nineveh Province. National Iraqi leaders have not taken this plan seriously, but it has a strong proponent in the Kurdistan Regional Government Minister of Finance Sarkis Aghajan, himself an Assyrian and a prominent figure in the Kurdish government. Minister Sarkis has claimed that the autonomous region he envisions would stretch from the Syrian border to the north at Peshkabur to Bakhdida. He says it would have its own parliament, executive council, constitution, budget, logo, and flag.[10]